Hervé Boissière is a producer, broadcaster, and promoter of music, mainly classical, for over 30 years.
He began his career as a stage manager at the Marionnettes de Bourgogne in Beaune, where he was born on September 12, 1966. There he discovered the magic of live performance, the artists, the backstage, the tours, the audiences. His choice was made and studies in Art History and Political Science were put aside to devote himself fully to this passion for music.
In 1987, he joined the press department of the Opera de Lyon and every evening attended shows created in particular by John Eliot Gardiner, Kent Nagano, Georges Lavaudant and Maguy Marin.
During recordings sessions at the Lyon Opera, Hervé Boissière met Michel Garcin who suggested that in 1989 he join the prestigious Erato Disques label in Paris. New decisive artistic encounters appear: Scott Ross, Olivier Messiaen, Daniel Barenboim, Hélène Grimaud, William Christie… It is also the opportunity to conceive the creation of Warner Classics France which he developed until 1998. In the meantime, hundreds of recordings, with Nikolaus Harnoncourt and Maxim Vengerov among others, were released. The relaunch of the Das Alte Werk collection at Teldec, the development in Europe of the Nonesuch label, the second album of the Three Tenors in Los Angeles or the creative partnerships with Claude Nobs and the Montreux Jazz Festival illustrate the richness of his collaboration with Warner.
In 1998, Hervé Boissière created naïve classique with Patrick Zelnik, a new independent label, “une maison d’artistes”, which brought together eclectic and creative musicians, such as Jordi Savall, Marianne Faithfull, Accentus, Fazil Say, Seu Jorge, Pascal Dusapin, Grigory Sokolov… or the Vivaldi Edition which will remain an unrivaled discographic adventure to this day. He left his position of CEO of naïve in 2006 to found medici.tv.
In July 2007, Hervé Boissière brought together a team to broadcast 29 concerts live from the Verbier Festival. With real artistic, public, and technological success, the experience was perpetuated on May 1, 2008, with the Berliner Philharmoniker live from Moscow, thus marking the official launch of the medici.tv platform, which will quickly become the world leader in Classical music video streaming. In 2010, he joined forces with Pâris Mouratoglou to accelerate the growth of the platform.
The impact of medici.tv is then understood across the entire music industry with numerous world premieres (Written on Skin by George Benjamin for example), new experiences for audiences live at the Tchaikovsky Competition, Carnegie Hall or during prestigious events such as the New Year’s concert with the Wiener Philharmoniker. Hervé Boissière attaches particular importance to long-term partnerships as evidenced by loyal relationships with artists like Yuja Wang, Joyce DiDonato, Klaus Mäkelä or institutions like the Salzburg Festival and partners like Rolex, to name just a few. Since its inception, medici has broadcast more than 3,500 live events from 5 continents and offers online the world’s largest catalog of concerts, operas, ballets, master classes, archives, documentaries.
In 2020, Hervé Boissière was instrumental in the creation of a division dedicated to classical music within the Les Échos/LVMH Group, with the establishment of a new joint venture around medici.tv. On this occasion, he took over as executive director of the Mezzo channel and then organized the integration of EuroArts, a production company based in Berlin. Numerous synergies are then developed. Hervé Boissière also managed an ambitious policy of acquisition of audiovisual catalogs, including the documentary work of Bruno Monsaingeon.
Hervé Boissière has been awarded “Chevalier des Arts et Lettres” from the French Ministry of Culture. He is regularly invited as an expert in professional bodies (CNC, European Commission…) and several of his productions have been recognized by international prizes (Gramophone Awards, Victoires de la Musique…).
On April 15, 2024, Hervé Boissière will serve as Co-CEO of the Verbier Festival, alongside Martin T:son Engstroem, founder of the event internationally known since 30 years for its artistic and educational excellence.
